


a gentle failing of the light

by MaryPSue



Category: Dracula & Related Fandoms, Dracula - Bram Stoker, Twilight Series - All Media Types, Twilight Series - Stephenie Meyer
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-13
Updated: 2014-10-13
Packaged: 2018-02-21 01:00:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 738
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2449499
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MaryPSue/pseuds/MaryPSue
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When she turns her face away, presenting her white throat, it seems less like a surrender and more like a challenge.</p>
            </blockquote>





	a gentle failing of the light

The girl is dark-haired, dark-eyed, her porcelain skin so fine that he can see every blue vein that pulses just underneath the surface. She keeps her eyes down when he is introduced, but they flick up, just for a moment, to lock with his before she turns them demurely away. Her expression is distant, preoccupied, her delicate lips slightly parted as though on the edge of giving voice to some thought both vast and deep, and her hand is soft and very warm under his lips.

“A pleasure to make your acquaintance,” she says, her eyes still turned to the floor, and he places a finger under her pointed chin, gently raises her face until it is upturned towards him. Her eyes stay turned towards the floor, their dark lashes shuttering whatever emotion might be revealed therein.

“The pleasure is all mine,” he purrs, low and rumbling in his chest, and at last she meets his eyes.

…

The bedroom window is open, despite the steady light tap-tapping of rain outside. The girl is in bed, her hair loose and falling in dark waves to her waist, her night-dress glowing pale in the dim light from the moon, her bared throat nearly as pale as the sheets.

Her dark eyes are open and fixed upon the open window.

She doesn’t start at the flutter of wings, doesn’t cry out when the shadowy shape becomes a man, a dark and terrible stranger, invader of a thousand kingdoms, now invader of a single bedroom. She merely watches him, as he strides soundlessly across the room to her bedside, hovers over her in his dark clothing like the corrupted reflection of a priest speaking last rites.

When she turns her face away, presenting her white throat, it seems less like a surrender and more like a challenge.

…

There are those who love her, flapping, bird-like girls in bright finery and milk-white boys in satin waistcoats, her father with his grizzled beard and tarnished badge and well-oiled pistol, her mother with her eyes like a wild animal’s, ever-darting in search of the predator she knows creeps upon her, the dark boy with eyes that burn like coals and broad, scarred hands that know the secrets of iron and fire. They all fear in their own way, in sharp staccato bursts or in slow, rolling waves, in hysterical pleas or in silent prayers as she weakens, worsens, fades.

She alone has no fear.

When he comes to her at the last, she is too weak to raise her head, too weak even to turn it aside for him. But she follows his movements with her dark eyes, and, when he bares his sharp white teeth, she smiles.

…

It is St. George’s Eve when she rises, as pale as ever and with deep, dark hollows ringing her dark eyes, and her lips twitch into what might be a smile when she sees him standing waiting. Her voice is deeper, stronger, surer, when she asks him if he brought her flowers.

He takes her cold, cold hand, and under the moonlight pulls her gracelessly into the steps of an ancient dance.

…

She sleeps beside him, her fingers tangled into his hair, her lips still stained cherry-bright with the remnants of their feast, and he feels a tremendous ache he cannot name swelling in his chest.

…

He cannot hold her. She slips through his fingers, laughing, as the sunlight turns her dark hair to the dim fire of dying embers, as the shouts of deckhands and travelers turn the salt sea air blue with noise. She is a whirl of skirts along the gangplank, a flash of white hand and flowing hair from the deck, an albatross taking flight for a new world.

He would like to fancy that he has given her a gift. He knows, too well, that she would have taken it had it not been freely given.

He raises his hat in salute, as the ship unfurls her great white sailcloth wings.

…

_(“Hey there, what are you doing hiding in the corner here? Uh, I’m Mike. Mike Newton.”_

_“Bella.”_

_“Bella. Uh, that’s pretty. Is it…French, or something?”_

_“Italian, I think.”_

_“Oh, so you’re Italian? I’ve never met any European girls.”_

_“I didn’t say that.”_

_“But you just -”_

_“I’m thirsty.” A smile, flashed in the darkness; a glance from under dark lashes, shy but inviting. “Be a gentleman, and get me a drink?”)_


End file.
